The Naked Truth About Breast Cancer

I’ve written a lot about the trials and tribulations of being a breast cancer survivor in America in October. It’s not for the faint of heart.

In fact, if you’re like me, it’s damn hard to cut through the pinkwashing and pink nausea to maintain your love of all things October.

There’s pink on everything, from burly football players to massive fracking drill bits. There’s The Singing Mammogram (a do-wop song and dance that starts out with, “Boobs, Boo-Boobs, Boo-Boobs, Ta-Ta-Ta.” Check it out here, if you don’t believe me.)

When I went to the Susan G. Komen blogger summit in May, I got the impression the ship was being righted and we would see less disgusting and demeaning shenanigans in the name of “awareness” and greater focus on more important things, like research.

I guess I was wrong.

Breast cancer isn’t pink and it isn’t pretty.

We don’t need a song and dance to be “aware.”

We’re way past awareness.

We want answers.

We want to be able to use words like “cure” and “preventation” in real sentences about real women with real breast cancer. (Notice it’s not called “boobies” or “ta-ta” cancer.)

One of those real women is my friend, Lockey Maisonneuve, who I was blessed to join earlier this week on a road trip to Woodstock, NY. A yoga instructor and creator of the Let It Go Workshop, Lockey was there to do a photo shoot with Robert Sturman, world class photographer and artist.

After a rainy session in which Robert got amazingly beautiful yoga shots, Lockey wanted to do something different.

There, in an open field in October, she removed her top to tell her truth about breast cancer.

The image above was taken by me. It was truly moving to photograph the photographer and his subject at such an intense moment. To see Robert’s incredible image, make sure to visit his Facebook page.

You can read more about my day with Lockey and Robert, and see another picture of Lockey at my new blog.

I know I just wrote my Pinkwashing – Why I’m Not Buying It piece. But, for the record, this year I really wanted to avoid writing about the usual October storm of pink crap. It’s getting old and so am I, I guess.

Once again, I couldn’t not write about what was, for me, a pure statement of truth about breast cancer, this time juxtaposed against the decaying corn stalks of October.

It was the naked truth about breast cancer and I had to share it with you.

Especially now.

Survival > Existence,

Related Posts:

Pinkwashing – Why I’m Not Buying It

This Pinktober Let’s Reclaim the Power of Pink

Running on Empty – Coping with Cancer Stress